Washington's Predicament: Side With Either the Army or Islamists

The U.S. is playing a losing hand in Egypt right now, and it may have no choice but to play on in the short run. But in the long run, it needs to toss in these cards and draw some new ones.

The army's ouster of President Mohammed Morsi has left the U.S. with the same false choice it has grappled with for decades in Egypt: between the army on the one hand, and the Islamists in Mr. Morsi's Muslim Brotherhood party on the other.